Conor Harrington’s ‘Watch Your Palace Fall’ Exhibition

Last night saw the opening of Conor Harrington’s newest solo exhibition ‘Watch Your Palace Fall’ at Pace London in Soho, put on in conjunction with the launch of the monograph Conor Harrington: Watch Your Palace Fall by HENI Publishing, a retrospective of Conor Harrington’s painting career.

Presenting some eleven new works in the exhibition the Irish-born former graffiti artist has done what he does best, namely creating hyper-realistic images in the classical painting tradition of ethereal fighting scenes, incorporating abstract and obscured elements to accompany his bold Military subjects. Harrington often focuses in great detail on certain parts of the figure while obscuring others through his use of techniques including bold line work, shading, drip work and a striking colour palette to accompany his rich painterly style. Of the body of works in the show Conor Harrington states:

“These paintings are a nod to political deceit, the lies and half truths told to assume a role and gain power, the prevalence of social media selves at the expense of the real self and the graffiti alter ego, acquiring a pseudonym and hiding your true identity.”

The show is certainly impressive with each piece so full of depth, life and character, really creating a moment in time, truly absorbing. The exhibition runs until October 8th, so if you haven’t already, head along to see the great show for yourselves, you really won’t be disappointed. The Pace Gallery can be found at 6-10 Lexington Street, Soho.

The ‘Golden Mask’ a recurring theme within Conor Harrington’s works, including six of the pieces in the exhibition, which relates to his view that the classical portrait can become potentially rendered without a true identity in the face of an alter ego.

So much texture in these absorbing works.

‘Slugger’s Paradise’ – portraying a tug of war scene between two political parties as depicted by the classic blue and red schemes for each respective canvas set to represent the position of the opposing major political parties. This demonstrates how more recently in his work Conor Harrington has become enthralled with colour as method of marking allegiance through nationalist symbolism, principally in his use of flags and uniforms as key dynamics in his works.

Fab show – excellent write up! Conor’s works are fascinating and impressive (you really don’t appreciate the scale of the work from the photo!) love the rationale of the social media self in these works, really interesting concept. 🙂